Maximizing Section 8 Rent -- Boston (Dorchester/Roxbury)

[Maureen F.]

My son has a 3-unit house under agreement with a S. 8 tenant in a 3BR unit.  (He will owner-occupy one of the units.)  It's in the Dorchester/Roxbury area, I guess we could call it a C+/B- area.  The current owner just leased it to the S. 8 tenant two months ago, so she has ten months left under lease.  The rent is $1600 (tenant pays all utilities except water/sewer) and we think the owner could have gotten a higher rent if he did a better job marketing.   (The ad only asked for $1600 and the photos were poorly done -- although the max that would have been allowed in 2015 given the utility allowance was $1671).   Anyhow, we looked up the S. 8 Payment Standard and it looks like the 3BR went up by $278 on 1/1/16 from $1861 to $2139 (which is an amazingly big increase but indicative of what's happening in the market).  The utility allowance for this unit is $190, so now the maximum allowable rent would be $1949.  It's a large unit with laundry hook-up; we estimate that the market rent is $1800.   Thinking ahead to next fall we want to petition the BHA for a rent increase.  Does anyone have experience and an idea of how difficult that would be?  Do we have to show that the rent is reasonable for the immediate area by presenting data about comparable units rented to market rate tenants?

[James Harrison]

Maureen, 

Also, make sure you send in the letter 60 days BEFORE the lease is up to the Housing Authority. I'd even recommend 90 days before. The Housing Authority (HA) leasing officer or tenant rep will refer your request to their Market Analyst who will have you fill out additional paperwork justifying the rent increase so the process takes a minimum of 60 days, sometimes longer. 

I usually write something simple on rent increase like "keep up with real estate taxes, water bills, maintenance and the current FMR per HUD for the area".

There are some nuances to the different HAs in the Boston area so that pays a large factor along with the tenant's current portion and income status, along with the grade the inspector gives you.  

I get $1850 on all new incoming 3-bedroom voucher holders typically, so you shouldn't have a hard time getting an increase when it's due but there are a lot of factors that come in play. 

Best of luck to your son.